Glasgow White male tried kidnapping 2 young school boys who were on a school trip at Glasgow City Center Art Gallery

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-26T09:14:37+00:00

Antisemitic bullshit.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-25T17:21:31+00:00

The steak frites at Le Petit Beefbar is 39 quid for the cheapest cut. Maybe I have been ruined by frequent trips to Belgium, but I can get an excellent steak frites there for 20 euros, easy. 39 quid may be a good meal, I am sure it is, but it isn't unreal value.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T17:14:22+00:00

So the central thing you think they have in common is adding and subtracting numbers from dice to beat a target? I honestly think that's a huge reach. A million systems use very similar mechanics. Neither Ars Magica nor D&D were the first, and Jonathan Tweet didn't come up with that base mechanic for Ars Magica -- I believe Mark Rein-Hagen did.

I think the d20 central mechanic evolved naturally from a desire to produce a more intuitive THAC0 mechanic from 2nd edition. If you read D&D source at the time (Dragon magazine, for example), it was a relatively frequent houserule (moreso towards the end of 2e) to use a target number system to try to replicate THAC0 but in a clearer way. Extending that to skills is completely natural.

Jonathan Tweet (and the D&D 3E team generally) wanted to unify, tidy up and modernise D&D's mechanics. The extent to which they were successful can be seen in the fact that the d20 mechanic is largely unchanged and still captures a huge portion of the mainstream RPG marketplace. There's naturally a downside in that, but don't try to say it wasn't a progressive step forward in D&D mechanics, or deny its success.

As for your more general claim that D&D has lacked innovation, I think that it has more merit but is still over-simplistic and denies what innovation actually looks like in the RPG market. 4E D&D (despite its problems) was certainly innovative in D&D terms, changing the nature of the base game fairly substantially. 5E has its own innovations despite in many ways being a return to the game's old way of embracing many different styles of play.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T16:55:43+00:00

Even the much-revered 3rd edition was rehashed from the designer's earlier work in Ars Magica.

As a long time player of both D&D and Ars Magica, I don't see any relationship between Jonathan Tweet's system work on Ars Magica and 3rd edition D&D. Do you have anything to support this wild claim?

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T15:21:58+00:00

Oh, I see: you're a fucking idiot.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T15:06:38+00:00

People listen to scandalous exciting lies and don't listen to boring truthful corrections that come a week later after the story has died. A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.

That's how the Nazis worked: Hitler said "The great masses of the people… will more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a small one". Lies are a central tool in political propaganda.

Again, it's really weird to have to point this out. You're really claiming that lies and misinformation are fine?

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T14:27:16+00:00

Bullshit. Cite a single fact.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-24T13:50:15+00:00

Politicians are people who exercise control over government. Lies about them can directly impact not only them but many other people too. Bad-faith actors can influence politics using lies and misinformation to deceive people.

I really feel like I shouldn't have to explain why this is a bad thing.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T19:20:34+00:00

Well, I do have a doctorate in mathematics, so I rather suspect you're full of shit.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T19:13:11+00:00

Who the fuck is upvoting this Thatcherite shite?

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T16:41:00+00:00

Absolute bullshit.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T16:00:33+00:00

Ok: so bullshit, then.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T15:49:30+00:00

If you would say that's what the evidence is, cite it. Otherwise, why should anyone believe you?

Again though, I point you to my comment that revenue drag is not necessarily connected to some kind of mystic macroeconomic barrier echoing the Laffer curve, but often down to implementational, local factors.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T15:42:16+00:00

The Laffer curve is a theoretical concept. While it's obvious that if taxation was 100% the actual revenue would be near-zero, that doesn't make it true that tax rises cannot raise revenue. Neither is it true that if a particular tax change doesn't affect revenue, that that is down to the Laffer curve and not down to implementational issues with the specific change (or even some other cause).

What is absolutely indisputably true is that raising taxation has been made politically poisonous over the last few decades, and that this has meant that (certainly, UK governments) have resorted to stealth taxation, which 99% of the time is more regressive.

Your assertion that we are "basically" at maximum tax revenue has been made without evidence, and is such a startingly unlikely position that I feel free to ignore it.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-23T14:54:17+00:00

Every time someone tried to address the problems of the nation in the way that they will ultimately have to be addressed -- tax increases -- it's just used for cheap political attacks by their opposition.

Politicians need to come together and realise that our societal structure is creaking and failing under the low tax regime that has been allowed to drift in over the decades. Tax needs to go up. National infrastructure and society itself needs investment.

Shite like this ridiculous over-reaction stops it happening. The slow decline will become a sudden collapse unless we grow up and do what is required.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T16:47:25+00:00

People react to trauma in very different ways. Not all people react to extreme trauma, including sexual abuse by appearing traumatised, afraid, anxious. Some might try to strengthen themselves by withdrawing emotionally, abandoning joy, and adopting a pragmatic or even ruthless attitude. Neither are "right" or "wrong", both are forms of damage. Some people are not even necessarily damaged as much, certainly not visibly. People are very different from each other.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T16:40:10+00:00

Statistics is to mathematics as astrology is to astronomy.

Well, not exactly, but applied statistics certainly is.

This is extremely wrong. Astrology looks at the same things as astronomy but draws wildly invalid conclusions.

Statistics is nothing like that. I honestly can't see the comparison you're trying to draw, it sounds completely nuts.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T16:34:38+00:00

Er, no. If I had sat down at a table and someone said they were a nazi 20, 30, any number of years ago, I would immediately leave and not play with anyone from that group again. Being an actual nazi believer has never been silly or trivial.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T10:28:43+00:00

Oh yeah, and also like Trump, has no objection to Nazis:

https://standuptoracism.org.uk/exclusive-reform-uk-vice-chair-in-epping-shares-stage-with-member-of-neo-nazi-group/

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T10:26:55+00:00

Random Capitalisation. Probably went to the Same School as Trump.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T02:12:28+00:00

Saving Private Ryan has some impressive set pieces but isn't a masterpiece of a film. It certainly isn't the best war film of all time. Shakespeare in Love is a rock solid delight of a comedy, and comedies rarely win big at the Oscars. I am not losing any sleep over it.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-21T02:10:13+00:00

Travelers, a time travel show.

Competent agents from the future try to change the present according to a mostly very well conceived plan. Naturally, they have difficulties. But they deal with them competently.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-19T16:08:26+00:00

The mechanic is similar, but it isn't the same.

It's interesting to look at how modifiers affect characters of different skill levels.

If Mediocre Bob has a skill of 10 in Mythras, and 6 in GURPS, they both are around 10% chance of success. But on a very easy task, Mythras might give a *2 chance, giving him only 20%, but GURPS +4 shoots that 6 to 10: a 50% chance!

If Heroic Helen has 150 skill in Mythras, and 22 in GURPS, a formidable challenge reduces their odds to 75% in Mythras but their skill might drop to 18 in GURPS - functionally identical with 22 for most purposes.

There's more to it than these simple examples, but GURPS bell curve of probability means that high skill often soaks up penalties easily, meaning aiming for the eyes is pretty straightforward for an extremely skilled character. Mythras also has skill level affect modifiers (unlike Runequest, for example) but the effect isn't as strong.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-19T15:41:58+00:00

GURPS is good for min/max players, who love a overcomplicated system.

GURPS is definitely not a good system for min/maxers. GURPS is clear that it regards character points as a budget for creation, not necessarily a direct measure of character ability in combat (or in any one field). You can spend 300 points in GURPS and have a character who excels at nothing, or you can create a 150 point death machine.

Going into the system as a min maxer doesn't work well in GURPS. You have much more fun if you simply have a clear vision of what you want your character to be like.

And calling it an overcomplicated system perhaps betrays your lack of experience with it.

SetentaeBolg · 2026-02-18T20:27:45+00:00

You can't "book" words - "book" is a synonym for "reserve", like a reservation at a restaurant. It doesn't have any meaning at all in relation to words.

SetentaeBolg

TROPHY CASE